


this is the eye of the hurricane

by Flora_Obsidian



Series: found families [7]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Bittersweet, Gen, Rey Skywalker, like everything is happy but we all know what's coming, we know e x a c t l y what's coming
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-17
Updated: 2017-05-17
Packaged: 2018-11-01 18:11:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10927266
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Flora_Obsidian/pseuds/Flora_Obsidian
Summary: The universe ebbs and flows and settles around them, and the air is still and calm, and the sun is warm against their skin-- just for a moment, all too rare and fleeting, there is peace.(moments of calm in the midst of the chaos which is the Skywalker clan)





	this is the eye of the hurricane

**Author's Note:**

> Technically I guess you can read this as a standalone, but if you haven't, I suggest at least reading _lights will guide you home_ first beforehand to get a better idea of what's happening.

“It's so _nice_ out!”

“You always say that.”

“It's true, though!”

Rey flops back into the grass, arms spread, eyes closed, face turned towards the sun. She's smiling. Finn sits down next to her, continues the lighthearted banter regardless.

Poe watches.

Finn is probably the only one who can get away with teasing Rey, who has, without fail, commented on how much she loves the weather every single day at every single base the Resistance has holed up in for the time being (except for the one on Hoth, though they had only spent two short months there before moving on again). The sight of so much _green_ hasn't lost its shine for her, probably never will, and Finn _gets_ that. Finn, who grew up in a training facility, who spent so much of his time indoors, in simulations, he understands that feeling.

“It's so _green_! And the breeze! And the trees!”

“You _did_ read the data stick we got, right? Had a bunch of info about this place so people could prepare for it.”

“Oh, _hush_! I know you feel _exactly_ the same way, don't try to tell me you don't! Seriously, I have the Force, I know when you're lying.”

Poe's next mission isn't for another standard week. Finn isn't on duty until the evening, and it's not even what passes for noon on this planet, yet. Rey is still training in the Force, but she knows enough after fifteen years of tutelage from her grandfather that she lets herself take breaks, learning slowly how to relax. It's a rare moment where they all have time to spare, and Rey isn't really _wrong_ when she waxes poetic about how green the planet is (it's really green), and there's a clearing near a lake not terribly far from the base where Rey normally goes to meditate, quiet and out of the way.

The grass is soft underneath him. There are birds singing in the trees, and the sunlight filters through the leaves and branches, liquid gold dappled on the ground, glittering off the water, still not enough to outshine their smiles.

Force, does he love watching them smile.

“Are you just going to stand there?” Finn looks at him curiously. Poe smiles back, then, shakes his head.

“Sorry, lost in thought.”

He sits, follows Rey's example a moment later and lies back. The grass is soft. Rey shuffles around so her head is on his chest; Finn smiles and settles down next to them both; the air is warm and the birds are singing and maybe, if he closes his eyes, he can pretend there's no First Order, no threat, no worries pressing down on them.

Just for a moment.

* * *

Sandstorms are, quite frankly, miserable. Rey hates the sand, and she hates the scavenging, and she hates the way that her stomach starts to ache after day two of not being able to leave her shelter because without scavenged scrap she can't get rations and without rations her water supplies start to dwindle and she only has the ancient ration bars tucked off to the side and--

“There's sand in my hammock.”

She sounds like she's pouting. She _is_ pouting. She wants to sleep, but the noise doesn't stop, and it's hot and dry, and she's hungry, and there is _so much sand._ Her eyes prick with tears, and she sucks in a sharp breath to hold them back. Crying wastes water. She can't waste water.

“ _There's a lot of sand,”_ says Grandpa, who is trying to make her laugh but is only succeeding in annoying her and being decidedly unhelpful. She wants to sleep, but the noise doesn't stop, and it's hot and dry, and she's hungry, and her leg still throbs when she tries to move because she was just trying to scavenge and someone tried to _steal her salvage--_ she hates scavenging. She hates this planet. Next time Grandpa tells her she should take a ship and leave, she's going to. She'll visit all the planets her grandparents have told her about that _don't have any sand_.

“Shut up,” she snaps, and scoops up a handful of sand from her hammock and throws it at him. It falls through him, because he's a ghost, and ghosts aren't really here, but he looks offended all the same. He hates sand just as much as she does.

“ _Okay,”_ says Grandpa, and shuts up.

Rey sighs. There are one hundred and eleven marks on the wall of her new home. The walls of the fallen Imperial Walker rattle with the force of the winds, and she hopes they'll withstand the storm. The Graveyards are large, but she has to go further out as the years go by to find salvage that hasn't already been picked over. It's hard enough to find enough to trade for rations, much less things like sealant, or power cells, or fabric so she can make new clothes. She grows fast.

“I didn't mean it,” she says, still staring at the ceiling. Sand and dust swirls through the air. There's a hairline fracture in the durasteel surrounding her, somewhere, there has to be. She'll have to find it, and fix it, with time and supplies, neither of which she has.

“ _I know,”_ says Grandpa. _“Come on, sit up.”_

She glares at him. Moving makes her leg hurt, and he knows it. He's the one who's been telling her that she shouldn't be moving at all, except they both know she needs to, since if she doesn't move, she doesn't work, and if she doesn't work, she doesn't eat or drink. Therefore, if she doesn't move, she dies.

She hates sand.

She sits up enough to look at him properly, but doesn't get out of her hammock, even though she can feel the grit under her clothes.

“ _Your grandmother and I were married on Naboo,”_ he says, and she sighs. She asked to hear this story so many times when she was younger that she can repeat it word for word, even though Grandpa and Grandma both tell it different ways.

At the same time, there's something familiar about it, and comfort comes hand in hand with familiarity. She tries to listen to his voice instead of the noise of the wind around them.

“ _Technically, we were married before that, but that was accidental. Different traditions on Tatooine. Especially different. She's royalty, your grandmother. Slaves get married in secret, no priest, no fancy dress. Ours was the only wedding I've ever seen that was held in the day. But that's a different story-- it was springtime, on Naboo, cooler than it ever got on Tatooine, even at night, and all the trees were green, and all the flowers were in bloom. She had her mother's wedding dress taken from storage, all white and lace-- that's tradition on Naboo, as well, that both parties wear white. White's a different color meaning on Tatooine, but that's a different story. And our witnesses were Threepio and Artoo, and we were married in a garden on her property...”_

She doesn't sleep that night. Her leg is in pain, and the sand is itchy, and her stomach cramps with hunger, and her throat aches with thirst, and the sandstorm never abates. But she feels a little better, listening to him talk, lying in the blue glow cast by his figure.

* * *

“Farmboy!” comes the distant shout. Luke, shoulder deep in X-Wing parts, legs sticking out from underneath the belly of his ship, rolls his eyes but slides out regardless, climbing up to his feet with a stretch and a smile. Mara is walking across the docking bay with a confidence in her step that only seems to have grown along with the swell of her stomach-- he would never dream of trying to limit what she does, though she still thinks he worries too much, and he feels like he worries too little. Five months pregnant and she wears an oversized pair of grease-stained overalls, still making repairs on the _Jade Sabre_ when she has the time and energy.

“Assassin,” he shoots back, and she swats his arm when she gets close enough. Her red hair hangs freely over her shoulders, expression bright with life and a kind of contentment that he knows his all too rare for them both.

“Please don't flirt in front of me,” comes a quiet voice, and Luke smiles at Ben, lurking behind her and carrying a box under his arm.

He worries about his sister's son; he takes after her in many ways, his eyes and his hair and the curve of his lips when he smiles, his temper and how quick he is to anger. Ben is much like his sister, in that respect-- much like his grandfather. Troubled, too, though the boy refuses to talk much about it, and Luke isn't going to press, fearing that he will only make things worse. His nephew is here to learn, to control himself, and Luke can't help without feelings of trust between them.

Besides, it's only been a few months since the _Falcon_ brought him here, and Luke knows he was largely absent in his nephew's life up until this point. Patience was never one of his strong suits, but it is patience he needs right now.

“What've you got there?” he asks, trying to wipe some of the engine grease off of his hands onto his coveralls and failing dismally.

Ben shifts a little on his feet and peers up at him through his dark brown fringe. “...Food? Master Jade--”

Mara clears her throat. The tips of Ben's ears go bright red.

“Um. Auntie Mara...? Said you were working too hard and we should go eat. But it's heavy, and she's gonna have the baby, so I'm carrying it for her.”

Luke raises an eyebrow at his wife, who smirks back, eyes sparkling. “ _I'm_ working too hard? This is what I do to relax.”

“Your nephew brought you food, Luke!” Mara gasps, pretending to take offense at his words. “Someone goes out of their way to bring you gifts...”

“Okay, okay!” He holds up his hands in a mock-surrender, laughing, and smiles again at Ben. “Thank you very much for carrying this here. Would either of you like to sit with me? I was planning on eating out on the terrace when I was done, anyhow.”

“And you were going to finish _when_ , exactly?” Mara leans over to whisper loudly to Ben, drawing a laugh that gets hastily stifled behind clasped hands, his eyes wide: “Your nerfherder of an uncle tends to forget about the time when he gets into a project, probably would've stayed out all night if we hadn't come to find him.”

“Is it _really_ appropriate to be throwing insults at the head of the New Jedi Order?”

“I'm your wife, I do what I want.”

“Fair enough.”

Mara follows him out to the terrace, and Ben follows them both, and it seems that Mara expected this outcome and packed enough for all of them to eat in the large container, sandwiches and flasks of water and a few sweets tucked away at the bottom. The terrace outside the temple on Yavin is warm and sunny, and Luke smiles, the breeze ruffling his hair, catching in Mara's long tresses, and the light dancing across the sun-warmed stones. They coax some more smiles out of his nephew, a couple of shy laughs, and Ben eventually, shyly, not meeting their gazes, asks if he can touch Mara's belly.

His eyes go wide when he does. “The baby's kicking!”

Mara smiles at him. Luke closes his eyes and reaches out in the Force, wrapping his presence around the slowly growing life, strong and bright and feisty, if Mara's complaints are anything to go by. Then again, with their lineage, how could the child be anything but?

“You'll have a cousin in a few months,” he tells Ben. “A baby boy or girl to play with.”

“A baby cousin,” Ben repeats, awed. Then he bends over, very careful, to hug Mara around the middle. “Hi, Baby. I'm Ben. Gonna protect you, with your mom and dad.”

Their gazes lock for a moment over his head, and Luke blinks back sudden tears. That's his child and his nephew-- his _family_ , something he didn't really have for the years they fought with the Empire. Not family he knew of, at any rate. Not family like this.

“What's her name gonna be?” Ben asks, still hugging Mara with the side of his head gently resting on her stomach. His wife isn't one for hugs unless it's a person she trusts, and the both of them were terrified when they realized she was expecting-- _we can't raise a child, I never **was** a child, the Empire isn't fully gone yet, what if, what if, what if_\-- but she tolerates the contact. Her smile is soft.

"How do you know it's going to be a girl?" she asks, bemused.

"Just do."

Luke holds back a laugh. “Rey, for a girl, we think. After your mother's mother, Breha. Like you were named after Ben Kenobi."

“Rey,” Ben echoes, and beams up at them. “I can't wait to meet her.”

* * *

Em-Kay's Cadets were the first to arrive, but the Troopers keep on coming. They know as much of the world as Finn did when he first left, which is to say, they know very little at all, but he has learned and he can watch them learn, too. The children are never quite like normal children, for all that “normal” can be quantified, but they talk and laugh and start to learn to play. The adults throw themselves into work and what they know, a community amongst themselves, but with the freedom to do as they wish regardless.

He's sitting with a group of the newest escapees, too young to be called defectors, taken by older Troopers from their training base before the Officers could send them off to Medical for decommissioning as the Resistance forces approached. Yavin, the youngest of the former YV unit, is in his lap, and Delta and Doubles are teaching Ella and LJ how to play sabaac – who taught _them_ how to play sabaac, he isn't sure, but they have a disturbingly good set of expressions when it comes to bluffing.

“Finn,” says Yavin, one of the few words the little boy ever says. His other words are “Trooper,” “Cadet,” “fly,” and Finn's personal favorite, “Gen'ral Princess.” Leia can't even pretend to be annoyed by it. “Finn.”

“Hey, buddy,” Finn says, twisting a bit to peer down at the kid. “What's up?”

“Finn,” says Yavin, and smiles wide. A couple of his front teeth haven't grown in yet. He hasn't laughed, yet, but his smiles are enough for now. “Finn!”

“Hey, buddy,” Finn says again, and smiles back. “That's me. Can you say Yavin?”

“Finn,” says Yavin decisively, and he lets the matter drop.

Em-Kay's Cadets were the first to arrive. Other Troopers were quick to follow. It was a defected Trooper who freed Mara Jade from her cell, her serial number remembered only by the other Troopers who escaped the base shortly before Kylo Ren arrived in a rage; Ella and LJ had stayed behind for quite a long time, spreading the methods of Em-Kay's escape through their training facility until the whole place rose up in arms, and they were the ones to bring the rest of the Cadets to the Resistance while the remaining Troopers scattered to spread the word even more; entire bases have started their own revolution, and it is something the First Order cannot stop no matter how hard they try.

He's watching the children as they sit in the grass, talking or asking hesitant questions or learning how to play bolloball from the Cadets who have been here longer. Some of the older Troopers are helping teach; others are learning as well. Further off, Jania and Axe are talking, heads bent low in conversation. _Spies_ , in the Trooper divisions-- who ever would have thought?

The sun is warm. The former Cadets and former Troopers are learning something of what it means to be alive.

Yavin smiles in his lap, the red curls of his hair catching the light like the swirls of the planet he was named after.

* * *

He gives the students days off, of course. They all need a break from philosophy teaching, sometimes, and while he encourages them to use the Force and search for ways to apply it in day-to-day life, he doesn't give them much in the way of “homework” beyond that. Aayla, a young Twilek girl who had bought her own way off Tatooine based off of nothing but rumor of a place that would take her in, spends her free time climbing through the jungle, searching for new insects and creatures, loving every moment spent in the green after a lifetime of knowing nothing but desert; Lowbacca, Chewie's nephew, enjoys the shipyards; his students play games and explore parts of the old base and the planet that Luke himself had never even discovered.

It's one of those free days, though this one is unscheduled. Mara went into labor the night before, earlier than expected-- though she's tired today, and little Rey Skywalker is littler than Luke could have ever imagined-- so small, so _fragile_ , so light in his arms--! she's doing well, and their child is healthy. Ben sits with them, or outside their quarters to stave off visitors; Mara lets him hold her, just once, trusting of her nephew and the combined ability of both herself and Luke in the Force to prevent any accidental dropping.

The room is quiet, and Rey does little but nurse or sleep, and Mara, truth be told, hasn't done much but sleep, either. He doesn't blame her. She's _fine_ , and he knows she's fine, but she had quite adamantly told him four hours into labor that _if you ever do this to me again I will vape you where you stand_. Luke hasn't slept at all, though he feels drained-- happy, though, happier than he thought anyone could ever feel.

Holding his child in his arms, feeling the soft flutter of her presence in the Force and watching her eyes blink sleepily up at him-- had his mother ever held him and Leia like this, before she died? Is this what his father had felt like, looking at Luke through eyes unhindered by the overlay of his mask for the first time, lying in the empty hangar of the collapsing Death Star?

 _I'll do right by you_ , he tells the child, _his child_ , sending nothing but thoughts of love and hope and calm, all those joyful things he feels and can't quite put a name to. Rey yawns and snuggles deeper into her blanket. _I'll protect you-- we'll protect you, and keep you safe, and you will be loved. Even if we aren't there, never forget that. Wherever you are, I promise, you will be loved._

“Uncle Luke!” Mara is asleep again, and so is Rey, and so Ben is whispering in the quiet-loud kind of whisper of young children. It doesn't wake his daughter, though Mara cracks an eye open, and Luke turns, slow, to where his nephew is poking his head through the doorway. Ben hasn't slept very much, either, waking up at the commotion in the night, but Ben is also a child and very good at being energetic while sleep-deprived. “Uncle Luke!”

He looks more overjoyed than when he had held Rey, and Luke looks at him in bleary confusion for a few moments, and then Leia's hands are on her son's shoulders, and Han is nudging his way into the room in that way that he does, and Chewbacca has to duck to fit through the door but manages it regardless. Luke feels himself smile.

“Leia,” he murmurs, and his smile spreads to a grin. “Han-- come here and meet your niece.”

**Author's Note:**

> As always, thank you very much for reading, and I hope that you enjoyed. Comments and kudos are greatly appreciated.
> 
> For more writerly things, come find me on Tumblr @floraobsidian


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